Finland: Eleven Attractions and Natural Wonders

A quiet country of water and forest

Finland is a big, thinly populated country of about 5.6 million people on the northeastern edge of the Baltic, sharing a long land border with Russia and closer in feel to its Nordic neighbours Sweden and Norway. It is often called the land of a thousand lakes, an undercount — there are nearly 188,000 — and forest covers about three-quarters of it. The south holds the cities: Helsinki, Turku, Tampere. The north is Lapland, a sub-Arctic expanse of fell, bog, and reindeer where the sun does not set in midsummer and barely rises at midwinter.

The eleven below run from the capital and the southwest archipelago up through the Lakeland to the Arctic. Summer (June to August) is short, green, and light-filled; winter (December to March) is the season for snow, huskies, and the aurora.

1. Helsinki

Helsinki is a compact, sea-facing capital of clean neoclassical and Art Nouveau blocks, functionalist landmarks, and a design culture it takes seriously. The set-piece is Senate Square, framed by the white Lutheran cathedral; nearby are the red-brick Orthodox Uspenski Cathedral, the Temppeliaukio rock church, the harbourside Market Square, and the Design District of small studios and shops. The Oodi central library and the wave-roofed Kiasma and Amos Rex museums show the contemporary side.

In summer the city decamps to its islands and the long Baltic light; the harbour ferries and the tram network make it easy to get around.

2. Suomenlinna

Suomenlinna is a sprawling maritime fortress built by Sweden from 1748 across six linked islands guarding the sea approach to Helsinki, later held by Russia and then Finland. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and also a living neighbourhood of around 800 residents, with grassy bastions, tunnels, a dry dock still in use, a submarine, museums, cafés, and picnic spots looking out to the Baltic.

The ferry from the Market Square takes about 15 minutes and runs year-round; a visit is a half-day, easily a full one in summer.

3. Turku and the archipelago

Turku, at the mouth of the Aura on the southwest coast, is Finland's oldest city and its capital until 1812. It has a 13th-century brick cathedral, a stout medieval castle by the harbour, riverside museums, and a lively student scene. Just offshore begins the Archipelago Sea, one of the densest island groups on earth — tens of thousands of skerries and islands threaded by the Archipelago Trail, a loop of small roads, bridges, and cable ferries made for cycling.

Ferries from Turku also cross to the Åland Islands and on to Stockholm.

4. The Åland Islands

Åland is an archipelago of some 6,700 islands between Finland and Sweden — an autonomous, demilitarised, Swedish-speaking region of Finland with its own flag, stamps, and parliament. Mariehamn, the small capital, keeps the four-masted windjammer Pommern as a museum ship and has a good maritime museum; beyond it the islands are low, farmed, and ringed by water, linked by a free network of inter-island ferries.

It is a cycling and sailing destination above all, reached by ferry from Turku or a short flight from Helsinki.

5. Porvoo

Porvoo, about 50 kilometres east of Helsinki, is Finland's second-oldest town and its prettiest old quarter: a hill of narrow cobbled lanes and small wooden houses below a medieval stone church, and a line of rust-red former storehouses along the river, painted that colour, tradition says, to greet a visiting Swedish king. It is full of cafés, chocolatiers, and craft shops.

It makes an easy day trip by bus, or in summer by an old steamboat down the coast.

6. The Lakeland and Olavinlinna

The Finnish Lakeland, filling much of the country's southeast, is a maze of interconnected lakes, islands, ridges, and forest — the classic Finnish summer landscape of the lakeside cabin (mökki), the rowboat, and the wood-fired sauna. Its centrepiece is Olavinlinna at Savonlinna, a well-preserved medieval castle built on an islet in 1475 to hold the Swedish–Russian frontier, which each July hosts a celebrated opera festival in its courtyard.

Lake cruises, canoe routes, and the historic Puijo and Punkaharju ridge areas are all within reach.

7. Lake Saimaa

Saimaa is the fourth-largest lake in Europe and the heart of the Lakeland — 4,400 square kilometres of open water and roughly 14,000 islands. It is the only home of the Saimaa ringed seal, a freshwater seal cut off here since the last Ice Age, of which only around 400 survive; Linnansaari and Kolovesi national parks, best explored by canoe, are the places to look for one. The Saimaa Canal historically linked the lake to the Gulf of Finland.

Savonlinna, Lappeenranta, and Mikkeli are the main lakeside towns and cruise bases.

8. Koli National Park

Koli, in North Karelia, is a low range of quartzite hills whose bare white summits look west over the vast Lake Pielinen. The view from Ukko-Koli has been a symbol of Finnish landscape since the 19th century, painted by Eero Järnefelt and others and set to music by Sibelius. Trails run along the ridge and down through old-growth forest; in winter it is a small ski hill.

It is a few hours' drive from Joensuu, with a historic hilltop hotel at the top.

9. Nuuksio National Park

Nuuksio, only about 35 kilometres from central Helsinki, is the easiest taste of the Finnish forest: a rugged area of pine ridges, small dark lakes, bog, and boulder fields, with the endangered Siberian flying squirrel among its residents. Marked trails of a few kilometres to a full day start from the Haltia nature centre, and there are lean-to shelters and campfire spots for a first go at Finnish outdoor life.

It is reached by bus from Espoo and makes a half-day escape from the city.

10. Rovaniemi and Lapland

Rovaniemi, rebuilt to an Alvar Aalto plan after its destruction in 1944, is the capital of Finnish Lapland and the main gateway north. On its edge, right on the Arctic Circle, is Santa Claus Village, an all-year Christmas complex where you can meet Santa, cross the Circle line, and send post from his office. In town, the excellent Arktikum museum covers Arctic nature and Sámi culture.

From here, winter trips run to husky and reindeer farms, snowmobile safaris, and the ski resorts of Levi, Ylläs, and Saariselkä further north.

11. The northern lights and the Lapland wilderness

In the far north the aurora is visible on roughly two nights in three when skies are clear, from September to March. The best bases are away from town lights: Inari and Lake Inari, the Sámi cultural centre Siida, the fells of Saariselkä and the vast Urho Kekkonen National Park, and Kilpisjärvi in the northwestern arm. Glass-roofed cabins and "aurora bubbles" let you watch from bed.

This is also Finland's emptiest country — reindeer herding, autumn ruska colours, midnight sun in June, and long ski and hiking routes through Pallas-Yllästunturi and other northern parks.

A first trip usually pairs Helsinki with either the southwest (Turku, the archipelago, Porvoo) or a few days in the Lakeland. Lapland is a separate journey, best in winter for snow and aurora or in late summer for hiking; it is a 1.5-hour flight or an overnight train from Helsinki.